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Uir-^tfi^-^ «»• 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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^^f I^ast Speech 
President McRinley 



Delivered at 

The Park-American Exposition 

Buffalo 

September 5tl\. 1901 

(the day- before His assassination) 



THis ss>eecK accompanies a set of stereoscopic vie'ws 
tHat ■were made by special permission by one of otir 
special artists -wHile otir President 'Mras delivering tHis 
most celebrated address. 

We ■were allo'W^ed on a stand tHirty feet in front of 
tKe President and permitted to maKe tHese negatives 
■ivHile He ^vas speaRin^. 

JAMES M. DAVIS 



21 AVasKington Place 
NE'W YORK 

Liverpoolt En^>> 21 Sai:\doi:\ 
Buildings, Old Post Office 
Place 



1207 Dolman Street 
ST. LOUIS. MO. 

Toronto, Can., 52 Bay St. 
Sydney, Australia 



^1 



*" NOV. ». 1^59 






"Problem of More Markets 

Requires our urgent and immediate attention 



"Must encourage our Merchant Marine" 



WE MUST HAVE MORE SHIPS; THEY MUST BE UNDER THE 
AIMERICAIN FLAG " — " Reciprocity Treaties are In Harmony 
with the Spirit of the Times; Measures of 
Retaliation Are INot." 



President Milburn, Director General Buchanan, Commissioners, Ladies 

and Gentlemen : 

I am glad to be again in the city of Buffalo and exchange greetings 
with her people, to whose generous hospitality I am not a stranger 
and with whose good will I have been repeatedly and signally honored. 
Today I have additional satisfaction in meeting and giving welcome to 
the foreign representatives assembled here, whose presence and participa- 
tion in this exposition have contributed in so marked a degree to its 
interest and success. To the commissioners of the Dominion of Canada 
and the British Colonies, the French Colonies, the Republics of Mexico 
and Ceutral and South America and the commissioners of Cuba and 
Porto Rico, who share with us in this undertaking, we give the hand of 
fellowship and felicitate with them upon the triumphs of science, educa- 
tion and manufacture which the old has bequeathed to the new century. 

Expositions are the time-keepers of progress. They record the world s 
advancement. They stimulate the energy, enterprise and intellect of the 
people, and quicken human genius. They go into the home. They 
broaden and brighten the daily life of the people. They open mighty 
storehouses of information to tlie student. Every exi)Osition, irreat or 
small, has helped to some onward step. Comparison of ideas is always 
educational; and as such instructs the brain and hand of man. Friendly 



rivalry follows, which is the spur to industrial improvement, the inspira- 
tion to useful invention and to high endeavor in all departments of 
human activity. It exacts a study of the wants, comforts and even the 
whims of the people, and recognizes the efficiency of high quality and low 
prices to win their favor. The quest for trade is an incentive to men of 
business to devise, invent, improve and economize in the cost of produc- 
tion. Business life, whether among ourselves, or with other people, is 
ever a sharp struggle for success. It will be none the less so in the future. 
Without competition we would be clinging to the clumsy and antiquated 
processes of farming and manufacture and methods of business of long 
ago, and the Twentieth century would be no further advanced than the 
Eighteenth century. But though commercial competitors we are, 
commercial enemies we must not be. 

HAS DONE ITS WORK WELL. 

The Pan-American Exposition has done its work thoroughly ; pre- 
senting in its exhibits evidences of the highest skill and illustrating the 
progress of the human family in the Western Hemisphere. This portion 
of the earth has no cause for humiliation for the part it has performed in 
the march of civilization. It has not accomplished everything ; far from 
it. It has simply done its best, and without vanity or boastfulness, and 
recognizing the manifold achievements of others, it invites the friendly 
rivalry of all the powers in the peaceful pursuits of trade and commerce, 
and will co-operate with all in advancing the highest and best interests of 
humanity. The wisdom and energy of all the nations are none too great 
for the world's work. The success of art, science, industry and invention 
is an international asset, and a common glory. 

After all, how near one to the other is every part of the world. 
Modern inventions have brought into close relation widely separated 
peoples and made them better acquainted. Geographical and political 
divisions will continue to exist but distances have been effaced. Swift 
ships and fast trains are becoming cosmopolitan. They invade fields which 
a few years ago were impenetrable. The world's products are exchanged 
as never before, and with increasing transportation facilities come in- 
creasing knowledge and larger trade. Prices are fixed with mathematical 
precision by supply and demand. The world's selling prices are regulated 
by market and crop reports. We travel greater distances in a shorter 
space of time, and with more ease than was ever dreamed of by the 



fatliers. Isolation is uo longer possible or desirable. The same important 
news is read, thou^^h in ditTorent lan^uaKes, tlie same day in all Cliriston- 
dom. The telegraph keeps us ailvised of what is occurring evcrywlien- 
anil the press foreshadows with more or less accuracy the plans and 
purposes of the nations. Market prices of products and of securities are 
hourly known in every commercial mart, and the investments of the 
people extend beyond their own national boundaries into the remote parts 
of the earth. 

OIN THE TICK OF THE CABLE. 

Vast transactions are conducted and international exchanges are 
made by the tick of the cable. Every event of interest is immediately 
bulletined. The quick gathering and transmission of news, like rapid 
transit, are of recent origin, and are only made possible by the genius 
of the inventor and the courage of the investor. It took a special 
messenger of the government, with every facility known at the time 
for rapid travel, ninteeen days to go from the city of Washington to 
New Orleans with a message to General Jackson that the war with 
England had ceased and a treaty of peace had been signed. How 
diflferent now ! We reached General Miles in Porto Rico by cable 
and he was able through the military telegraph to stop his army on 
the firing line with the message telling him that the United States 
and Spain had signed a protocol suspending hostilities. We knew 
almost instantly of the first shots fired at Santiago ; and the subse- 
quent surrender of the Spanish forces was known at Washington 
within less than an liour of its consummation. The first ship of Cer- 
vera's fleet had hardly emerged from that historic harbor when the 
fact was fiaslied to our Capital, and the swift destruction that followed 
was announced immediately through the wonderful medium of teleg- 
raphy. So accustomed are we to safe and easy communication with 
distant lands, that its temporary interruption even in ordinary times 
results in loss and inconvenience. We shall never forget the days of 
anxious waiting and awful suspense when no information was per- 
mitted to be sent from Pekin and the diplomatic representatives of the 
nations in China, cut off from all communication, inside and outside of 
the walled capital, were surrounded by an angry and misguided mob 
that threatened their lives ; nor the joy that thrilled the world when 
a single message from the government of the United States brought 



through our minister the first news of the safety of the besieged dip- 
lomats. 

A CENTURY'S DEVELOPMENTS. 

At the beginning of the Nineteenth century there was not a mile of 
steam railroad on the globe. Now there are enough miles to make its 
circuit many times. Then there was not a line of electric telegraph, now 
we have a vast mileage traversing all lands and all seas. God and man 
have linked the nations together. No nation can longer be indifferent to 
any other. And as we are brought more and more in touch with each other, 
the less occasion is there for misunderstandings and the stronger the dis- 
position, when we have differences, to adjust them in the court of arbitra- 
tion, which is the noblest form for the settlement of international disputes. 

My fellow citizens : Trade statistics indicate that this country is in 
a state of unexampled prosperity. The figures are almost appalling. 
They show that we are utilizing our fields and forests and mines, and 
that we are furnishing profitable employment to the millions of work- 
ingmen throughout the United States, bringing comforts and happiness 
to their homes, and making it possible to lay by savings for old age and 
disability. That all the people are participating in this great prosperity 
is seen in every American community and shown by the enormous and 
unprecedented deposits in our savings banks. Our duty in the care 
and security of these deposits and their safe investment demands the 
highest integrity and the best business capacity of those in charge of 
these depositories of the people's earnings. 

We have a vast and intricate business, built up through years of toil 
and struggle, in which every part of the country has its stake, which will 
not permit of either neglect or of undue selfishness. No narrow, sordid 
policy will subserve it. The greatest skill and wisdom on the part of 
manufacturers and producers will be required to hold and increase it. 
Our industrial enterprises which have grown to such great proportions 
affect the homes and occupations of the people and the welfare of the 
country. Our capacity to produce has developed so enormously and our 
products have so multiplied that the problem of more markets requires 
our urgent and immediate attention. Only a broad and enlightened 
policy will keep what we have. No other policy will get more. In these 
times of marvelous business energy and gain we ought to be looking to 
the future, strengthening the weak places in our industrial and com- 
mercial systems, that we may be ready for any storm or strain. 



WILL EXTEND OUTLET FOR SURPLUS. 

By sensible trade arrangements which will not interrupt our home 
production, we shall extend the outlets for our increasing suri)lus. A 
system which provides a mutual exchange of commodities is manifestly 
essential to the continued and healthful growth of our export tra<l«'. 
We must not repose in fancied security that we can forever sell every- 
thing and buy little or nothing. If such a thing were i)ossible it 
would not be best for us or for those with whom we deal, We should 
take from our customers such of their products as we can use witliout 
harm to our industries and labor. Reciprocity is the natural outgrowtli 
of our wonderful industrial development under the domestic policy now 
firmly established. 

What we produce beyond our domestic consumption must have a vent 
abroad. The excess must be relieved through a foreign outlet, and we 
should sell everywhere we can and buy wherever the buying will enlarge 
our sales and production, and thereby make a greater demand for home 
labor. 

The period of exclusiveness is past. The expansion of our trade and 
commerce is the pressing problem. Commercial wars are unprofitable. 
A policy of good will and friendly trade relations will prevent reprisals. 
Reciprocity treaties are in harmony with the spirit of the times ; measures 
of retaliation are not. 

If perchance some of our tariffs are no longer needed for revenue or 
to encourage and protect our industries at home, why should they 
not be employed to extend and promote markets abroad? Then, too, 
we have inadequate steamship service. New lines of steamers have al- 
ready been put in commission between the Pacific coast ports of the 
United States and those on the western coasts of Mexico and Central 
and South America. These should be followed up with direct steamship 
lines between the eastern coast of the United States and South American 
ports. One of the needs of toe times is direct commercial lines from our 
vast fields of production to the fields of consumption tliat we have but 
barely touched. 

Next in advantage to having the thing to sell is to have the convey- 
ance to carry it to the buyer. We must encourage our merchant marine. 
We must have more ships. They must be under the American flag, built 
and manned and owned by Americans. These will not only be profitable 
in a commercial sense, they will be messengers of peace and amity wher- 



ever they go. We must build the Isthmian canal, which will unite the 
two oceans and give a straight line of water communication with the 
western coasts of Central and South America and Mexico. The con- 
struction of a Pacific cable cannot be longer postponed. 

WOULD HAVE APPEALED TO BLAINE. 

In the furtherance of these objects of National interest and concern 
5 ou are performing an important part. This exposition would have 
touched the heart of that American statesman whose mind was ever alert 
and thought ever constant for a larger commerce and a truer fraternity 
of the Repviblics of the New World. His broad American spirit is felt 
and manifested here. He needs no identification to an assemblage of 
Americans anywhere, for tlie name of Blaine is inseparably associated 
with the Pan-American movement which finds here practical and sub- 
stantial expression, and which we all hope will be firmly advanced by the 
Pan-American Congress that assembles this autumn in the capital of 
Mexico. The good work will go on. It cannot be stopped. These build- 
ings will disappear ; this creation of art and beauty and industry will 
perish from sight, but their influence will remain to 

" Make it live beyond its too short living 
With praises and thanksgiving." 

Who can tell the new thoughts that have been awakened, the am- 
bitions fired and the high achievements that will be wrought through this 
exposition? Gentlemen, let us ever remember that our interest is in 
concord, not conflict ; and that our real eminence rests in the victories of 
peace, not those of war. We hope that all who are represented here may 
be moved to higher and nobler effort for their own and the world's good, 
and that out of this city may come not only greater commerce and trade 
for us all, but more essential than -these, relations of mutual respect, con- 
fidence and friendship which will deepen and endure. 

Our earnest prayer is that God will graciously vouchsafe pros- 
perity, happiness and peace to all our neighbors, and like blessings 
to all the peoples and powers of earth. 



